Changing farming systems to adapt to climate change in Senegal

In the last decade, discussions on the effects of climate change have become more intense. They mostly focus on reducing emissions in industrialised nations, but learning how to adapt to climate change is equally important. What lessons can policymakers learn from experiences to date?

Most farmers in Senegal practice rain fed production with basic technologies. However, since the 1970s, there have been successive droughts, a progressive reduction in rainfall and soil has become degraded. The government has policies to conserve forests and biodiversity and to develop irrigated agriculture and horticulture. Despite these efforts, 17 years of recurring drought mean that agricultural yields have declined, tree clearing has continued and poverty has increased.

Researchers from ‘Environment and Development in Third World Countries’, an organisation in Senegal, discuss a pilot farm in Sébikotane, Senegal, which has successfully adapted to the changing climate. Because of climate variations, the Sébikotane area has become unsuitable for agriculture. For example, it is close to the coast and wind erosion is a problem. The farm needed solutions not only to protect soils against wind, but also to restore lost productivity.

To adapt to these changes, farm workers learned to define their farm as a newly created ecosystem and manage it on this basis. They selected agricultural strategies that balance increased production with ecosystem sustainability. This technique is known as ‘producing the environment’.

The Sébikotane pilot farm is an agricultural system that increases yields at the same time as creating environmental benefits. The research shows:

• The Sébikotane system produces wood as well as crops. This means that it does not degrade the environment to process food. This is important in a country where 1.2 tons of wood are used to cook 1 ton of food.
• Agroforestry is combined with irrigation to protect soils against the wind whilst also creating microclimates that stimulate crop production. Drop irrigation is favoured because it is more efficient in terms of water and labour.
• Many farmers who have passed through the Sébikotane pilot farm have used the techniques learned on their own land. This is important in a country where rural depopulation is high and young people often abandon agriculture.
• One factor in the success at Sébikotane was that workers were young and relatively well educated.

The most important lessons of the Sébikotane experience is that the environment should be treated as a factor of agricultural production along with fertilisers, inputs and production techniques. Moreover, it is not possible to just protect, preserve and restore the environment, it is also possible to ‘produce’ it. Therefore, desertification is not an irreversible phenomenon.

Currently, these Sebikotane farming systems have evolved from pilot scale projects to a larger-scale programme; lessons from these projects are broadly implemented by many small scale producers in Senegal. For these, and other useful lessons from Sebikotane to be learned more widely, the research suggests:

• Strong government interventions, including education and financial support, are needed to develop people’s ability to think about agriculture in new ways.
• All links in the production chain – input sales, packing, processing and transport – must take place in rural areas rather than in cities. 
• Current three to five year cycles of adaptation programmes are not long enough. Learning to use this system takes a long time; similar adaptation programmes must be given long-term commitments.

Source(s):
‘Adaptation and Mitigation through “produced environments”: the case for agricultural intensification in Senegal’, IDS Bulletin 36.4, pages 71 – 86, by Moussa Seck, Moussa Na Abou Mamouda and Salimata Wade, 2005

id21 Research Highlight: 8 August 2006

Further Information:
Moussa Seck
Environement et Développement du Tiers-Monde (ENDA-TM)
4 & 5 Rue Kléber
BP 3370, Dakar
Senegal

Tel: +221 8 22 42 29 
Fax: +221 8 22 26 95
Contact the contributor: mseck@enda.sn

Environement et Développement du Tiers-Monde, Senegal

Institute of Development Studies, UK

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'Developments in adaptation: new responses to climate change'

'Adapting to climate change: developing countries and the global response'

'Facing up to forecasts – adapting to climate change'

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